Rail anchor



Aug. 6, 1963 J. J. GALLAGHER 3,100,081 RAIL ANCHOR Filed Sept. 17, 1957 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 INVENTOR. JOHN J. GALLAGHER 1963 J. J. GALLAGHER 3,100,081

RAIL ANCHOR Filed Sept. 17, 1957 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 mmvrox. 52 JOHN J. GALLAGHER United States Patent 3,100,081 RAIL ANCHOR John J. Gallagher, Denver, (1010., assignor to Poor & Company, Chicago, 111., a corporation of Delaware Filed Sept. 17, 1957, Ser. No. 684,542 1 Claim. (Cl. 238-327) The present invention relates to improvements in railway rail anchors, and particularly to rail anchors of the type comprising a rolled metal bar formed at one end with a hook adapted to be driven into expanded gripping engagement with the base portion of a rail and provided also with a relatively wide depending flange adapted to abut against an adjacent cross-tie to resist lengthwise creeping movement of the rail.

The type of rail anchor to which the present invention appertains has been made, heretofore, with a relatively wide tie-abutting flange, so as to provide a large area of contact with an adjacent cross-tie. Otherwise the creeping pressure exerted on the rail has a tendency to press the tie abutting face of the anchor into the crosstie. The wide tie abutting face of the anchor is therefore highly desirable, but it has presented an additional problem since it extends around the hook portion of the anchor and therefore provides the hook with excess rigidity. Because of this excess rigidity the hook is diflicult to apply and also has a low limit of elasticity. Consequently the application of the anchor to a rail requires extreme care to avoid flexing the hook beyond its elastic limit.

In rail anchors of this general class, as heretofore produced, the entire flexing of the hook end of the anchor, during its application to a rail, is concentrated in the bend of the hook which, as above indicated has a low elastic limit. In the event the hook is over-stressed, the resilient holding power of the hook is weakened. Also in the event of improper heat treatment of the anchor, such over-flexing may result in breakage of the hook.

The present invention is directed to improved constructions which overcome the likelihood of overstressing the bend of the hook portion of the rail anchor during the expansion of the hook incident to its application to a rail base. In this connection the invention includes a special form of rolled steel bar from which the anchor device is made. The bar is of general Y configuration in that it has a wide central flange and a pair of upwardly inclined lateral flanges which are co-extensive with the length of the bar and incline upwardly throughout their width. When the bar is bent into the hook form required for the anchor, the wide central flange of the bar, in addition to providing the anchor device with a wide tie abutting surface also extends around the bend of the hook to add rigidity thereto. This rigidity of the bend is somewhat greater than that required to provide the desired grip on the rail. Therefore in order to avoid the effects of this excessive rigidity, the vertically inclined flanges which engage the top and bottom surfaces of the base portion of a rail yield sufliciently, during the application of the anchor to the rail, to avoid overflexing of the bend of the hook.

The flexible laterally extending flanges of the improved anchor device, in addition to relieving the bend of the hook from concentrated localized stress are sufficiently resilient to vibrate independently of the central flange in harmony with the forced vibrations developed in a rail during the passing of traffic thereover. These vibrations are independent of the undulating or vertical wave motion of the rail and their oscillations are at a high rate, but they eflect momentary releases of the gripping effect of an anchor device unless the device is of suflicient resilience to vibrate in harmony with the rail. The present 3,100,81 Patented Aug. 6, 1963 ice flanges are of greater vertical resilience than the wide central flange and will therefore vibrate with the rail.

Other objects and advantages of the invention will appear from the following description.

A preferred embodiment of the invention is illustrated in the accompanying drawings wherein:

FIG. 1 is a fragmentary plan view of the base portion of a railroad rail and its underlying supporting structure together with a rail anchor device of the present invention applied to the rail base;

FIG. 2 is a side view of the rail anchor shown in FIG. 1, the rail base being shown in section;

FIG. 3 is a view similar to FIG. 2, but illustrating the rail anchor device in its initial position on the rail base;

FIG. 4 is a sectional view taken on line 44 of FIG. 3 after the anchor is subjected to applying pressure; and,

FIG. 5 is a sectional View taken under like conditions on line '5-5 of FIG. 3, looking in the direction of the arrows.

Referring to the drawings: The improved rail anchor is designated generally by reference numeral 1i It is shown applied to the base portion of a railway rail 11 and it is also shown in the process of application to the said rail base. The rail base is supported on a conventional supporting structure comprising tie-plate 12 positioned on the top surface of a wooden cross-tie 13 which is embedded in the ballast 14- of the roadbed. The tieplate is provided with spaced apart shoulders 15, 15 defining a seat for the rail base and provides a lateral abutments for the rail. The plate is secured to the cross-tie by means of spikes 16, the heads of which overlie the marginal portions of the rail base with a slight clearance. This clearance permits slight vertical movement of the rail relative to the tie-plate in response to the vertical wave movements of the rail, without imparting pumping movements to the cross-tie 13 in the ballast of the roadbed. The said wave movement of the rail is created principally by the rolling load of a train of cars moving along a trackway supported on spaced apart cross-ties 13.

The rail anchor 10 is a one piece device made from a rolled steel bar of special cnoss-section. The said crosssection of the bar is of general Y conguration and includes a central flange 17 provided along one longitudinal edge with a pair of diverging vertically inclined lateral flanges 18, 19. The three flanges 17, 18 and 19 are of equal thickness, the lateral flanges 18, 19 being defined by a curved channel 20 and filets 21, 22 at their junction with the central flange. This construction imparts substantially uniform thickness to all parts of the bar. This is an important consideration from the viewpoint of rail anchor production, since it promotes uniform heating of the metal stock preliminary to the bending of the metal stock into hook form and also promotes uniform quenching of the hot anchor device after it is removed from the forming dies. Uniform quenching of the hot anchor device is important to prevent latent weakness at locallized areas and particularly at the junctions of the lateral flanges 18 and 19 with the central flange 17.

The improved anchor is made from metal blanks having the above mentioned cross-section by bending one end of the blank into a book 23, with the lateral flanges 18, 19 defining the inner surface of the book. The other end of the blank is formed with an oifset 24, to provide a locking shoulder 25. The blank is provided with a pair of shoulders 26, 26 and a curved transverse recess 27, the purpose of which will be made clear presently.

The hook 23 provides the anchor device with upper and lower jaws 28, 29 (FIG. 2) adapted to be driven transversely of the rail base 10 into expanded gripping engage- 6 ment with the top and bottom surfaces of a rail base flange 30 at one side of the rail. The shoulder 25 is designed to engage the vertical edge 31 of the other base flange of the rail to hold the hook 23 in its applied position on the rail base, and the intermediate portion of the tie. This result not only damages the cross-tie, but eventually the anchor device becomes so embedded in the crosstie that it imposes the total creeping stresses on the tieplate 12 and on the rail spikes 16. While a wide tie abutting flange 17 is desirable to overcome the above objections such flange imparts greater rigidity to the bend 23 than is required to exert the desired grip on the rail base.

Accordingly, the present invention is directed primarily to the provision of improved structure which makes it practicable to utilize a wide central flange 17 and at the same time avoid the effects of the excessive rigidity of the hook 23. In this connection, the lateral flanges 18, 19' are joined to the central flange 17 by said curved portion 20, whereby the vertical central flange, when the anchor is applied to a rail, is spaced from the top and bottom surfaces of the rail base 1 1 and thereby permit the inclined lateral flanges 18, 19 of the upper and lower jaws 28 and 29 to flex in response to the applying force from the dotted positions 34 and 35 to the full line positions shown in FIG. 4. The said flanges 18, 19- will be also similarly flexed at the locking shoulder 25 until the applying movement of the anchor causes the shoulder 25- to snap over the lower edge of the rail into locking engagement with the edge surface 31 of the rail base.

The rail anchor is applied to the rail base by applying the hook 23 over one flange of the rail in the position shown in FIG. 3 of the drawings. In this initial position of the anchor the lateral flanges 18, '19 engage the rail base only at the region of the end of the upper jaw 28, at the lower jaw 29 and at the ofliset 24 of the locking shoulder 25, and the lower corner of the base flange 30 enters into the recess 27. The recess 27 permits the hook 23 to be inserted over the flange 30 to the position shown in FIG. 3 without expansion of the hook. Impact force is applied to a striking face 36 formed on the hook 23 to drive the anchor transversely of the rail until the looking shoulder 25 clears the edge 31 of the rail base and snaps upwardly into engagement with said edge 31. During this movement of the :anchor the upper jaw 28 is forced upwardly and inwardly on the inclined top surface of the base flange to its applied gripping position on the base flange 30. There is some expansion of the hook as a whole during this expanding movement, the flexing stresses being distributed uniformly around the curviline-al inner surface of the bend 37. The reltively rigid hook is relieved from excessive flexing stresses, and therefore protected from being flexed beyond its elastic limit, since the lateral flanges 18, 19 will yield, during the applying movement of the anchor, from the dotted line position shown in FIGS. 4 and 5 and thereby minimize the flexing of the bend of the hook. When the anchor reaches its applied position shown in FIG-2, the locking shoulder 25 moves upwardly to its operative locking position and thereby relieves a portion of flexing stresses imposed on the lateral flanges 18 and 19 and these flanges will partially resume the positions from which they were flexed. However, by virtue the resilience of said lateral flanges 18 and 19, they will exert a strong resilient grip on the rail in cooperation with the force exerted by the expanded bend 23 of the hook. These flanges being spaced above the upper edge of the more rigid central flange 17, vibrates independently of said flange and since they are pressed against the rail base, they will vibrate with the rail base during the passing of trafiic over the rail and thereby avoid the loosening influence which vibrations have in respect to rail anchors having a more rigid grip on the rail.

The position of the tie abutting flange against a cross tie and the abutting engagement of a lateral flange 18 or 19 against the tie plate effects uniform distribution of the rail creeping pressure to the tie plate and to a vertical side face of the cross-tie.

I claim:

A rail anchor comprising a steel bar having a hook at one end to provide upper and lower jaws adapted to be expanded into gripping engagement with the top and bottom surfaces respectively of a rail base flange at one side of the rail,

a horizontal body portion for extending across. beneath the rail base and having a locking shoulder for engaging an edge of the base flange at the other side of the rail;

the said bar being T-shape in crosssection and having a vertically disposed central rigidifying flange of greater vertical width than the overall transverse width of the bar and extending lengthwise thereof and around said hook with one edge of the central flange being positioned adjacent the rail base but spaced therefrom, l

and a pair of diverging lateral flanges united with the last mentioned edge of the central flange and inclined upwardly and outwardly a suflicient distance from their junction with said central flange to facilitate ready flexing thereof relative to the central flange and which terminate in flat marginal portions having frictional gripping engagement at their lateral edges and inwardly therefrom with the top and bottom surfaces of the rail base when the anchor is applied thereto;

the vertical distance between the terminal portion of the hook and said body, when the anchor is free of the rail, being less than the maximum thickness of the portion of the rail base embraced thereby, whereby said inclined lateral flanges are deflected vertically of the rail base to minimize the expansion of said bend of the hook during the application of the anchor to a rail, said locking shoulder also including a pair of diverging flanges which incline upwardly and outwardly from the central rigidifying flange and bear resiliently at their outer edges against the bottom surface of the rail to relieve the bend of the hook of excessive strains during application of the anchor to the rail.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,201,279 Elfborg Oct. 17, 1916 1,372,852 Warr Mar. 29, 1921 1,609,287 Blair Dec. 7, 1926 1,647,350 Gi-lhnor Nov. 1, 1927 1,662,618 Norwood Mar. 13, 1928 1,746,820 Cook Feb. 11, 1930 2,161,484 Preston June 6, 1939 2,462,548 Preston Feb. 22, 1949 2,717,740 Ruppert Sept. 13, 1955 FOREIGN PATENTS 178,151 Switzerland Sept. 16, 1935 

